“I doubt about myself, I think the doubts are good in life. The people who don’t have doubts I think only two things: arrogance or not intelligence.”

"When these kind of matches happen you suffer, but I really enjoy these moments. I really enjoy suffering, because what's harder is when I am in Mallorca last year and I had to watch these kind of matches on the TV."

Players, coaches and commentators often talk about ‘taking time away’ in a tennis match – the ability to starve opponents of the necessary milliseconds to cover the court and strike the ball cleanly. It’s a phenomenon anyone who has picked up a tennis racquet will recognise, but one that has never been quantified – until now.

Tennis Australia’s Game Insight Group has introduced a new stat to discuss the phenomenon in real terms. Time pressure – the average time a player takes away from his or her opponent on each shot – is one way a player can dictate a rally and is strongly associated with winning the point.

So how do players generate time pressure? It’s not simply a case of hitting the ball harder, explains GIG’s Dr Machar Reid, Head of Innovation at Tennis Australia.

“If you just look at ball speed, that doesn’t take into account where you’re standing on the court,” he explains. “Take Rafael Nadal – he often parks himself way back from the baseline, but he cranks the ball. Then there’s someone else, like a Bernard Tomic, who might be further up the court but doesn’t generate anything like the ball speed. What you’re feeling as an opponent is quite a bit different.”

Those differences are borne out in the top five ‘pressure makers’, those players identified by GIG as the best at applying time pressure. Subtract the time taken for a player’s ball to reach the net from the time taken by their opponent’s ball, and you have a player’s time pressure. A positive time represents a player successfully taking time away from their opponent; players with a negative number are the ones feeling time pressure.

GIG leaderboard pressure makers
“The two factors you are really looking at are contact point with the ball – in essence, how close you are to the baseline or net – and the speed they put on the ball. For example, among the men’s top five Cilic and Pouille are not necessarily heavy hitters with large amounts of spin, their strokes typically have a very flat trajectory which allows it to come through the court quickly. But they’re also trying to hold their position on the baseline as best they can. In contrast, Zverev is typically set further back from the baseline, but hits with higher ball speed.”

Of course, if tennis was simply about time pressure, all players would simply step closer to the baseline and hit harder. There are other ways to beat an opponent independent of taking time away.

“Time pressure doesn’t take into account the effect of the ball when it hits the court,” adds Reid. “When you think about Rafa’s steepling bounce off the court, that’s placing you in a really uncomfortable position in terms of you contact point, so you’re less likely to get as much purchase on the ball.

“We’re also not touching on where the ball is being directed. Some players will direct it closer to the lines than others, some players will mix things up and use their shot-making to create space – Roger Federer and Ash Barty, for example.”

Nevertheless, time pressure is an important part of the story of how tennis matches are won and lost, one that is now quantifiable and comparable in real time.

“I doubt about myself, I think the doubts are good in life. The people who don’t have doubts I think only two things: arrogance or not intelligence.”

"When these kind of matches happen you suffer, but I really enjoy these moments. I really enjoy suffering, because what's harder is when I am in Mallorca last year and I had to watch these kind of matches on the TV."

There is no doubt that 20-year-old Sascha Zverev is the most complete, consistent and advanced player among the ATP’s galaxy of rising stars. Nor is there any ambiguity about how the fast-rising world No.4 tolerates performances that fail to meet his already lofty standards.

He doesn’t.

So high has the bar been set for the German uber-talent - who won two Masters 1000 titles among five at tour-level for the season while soaring 20 rankings places to trail just Rafa, Roger, and Grigor Dimitrov - that plain-speaking is his preferred post-script.

After “choking” against Jack Sock when playing for a semi-final place at the Nitto ATP Finals in November, Zverev remarked: “It's been an awesome year. Still, the end of the year was absolute crap for me. If I would have played the whole year like I did, by the end of the year I don't think I would have finished top 50.”

Following his worst match, tennis-wise, a second-round loss to Borna Coric to exit a wide-open bottom half of the US Open draw and further extend a meagre record at the majors: “The way I played was upsetting. The tournament so far is upsetting for me. I know that I could have done some big things here. I know that I could have done something that I haven't done before. But I won't. It's just as simple as that.”

Asked what made the difference was in his first-round French Open flop against Fernando Verdasco: “I played absolute s*** made the difference. It's quite simple.”

I THINK PHYSICALLY I’M A LOT STRONGER. I AM ABLE TO LAST AGAINST THE BEST GUYS - NOT ONLY LAST, BUT PLAY AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL AT THE END OF MATCHES
Sascha Zverev
OK then. How did he assess his straight sets defeat to young rival Nick Kyrgios in the third round at Indian Wells, his so-called “worst match of the year” to that point? “My serving was absolute horrible, my returning was absolutely horrible. From the baseline was horrible. There is not one thing I did well.”

And yet, for all that, there is so much to like about the Zverev game that Federer describes him as having “the full package.” It’s hard to imagine Patrick McEnroe’s comments to the New York Times in mid-2016 not being vindicated - and soon.

Back then, McEnroe said there was nothing about the younger Zverev’s game that did not impress him: “He’s dangerous off both wings, with tremendous wingspan, a big serve and on-court presence. And he’s an excellent mover. His technique is second to none. Maybe he needs to get more comfortable in and around the front of the court and at net. He is as close to a lock as there can be to win multiple majors.”

The irony, then, is that the majors remain his missing link, with Zverev’s winning percentage at the slams of 0.545 comparing unfavourably with his overall number (0.626) and at the elite Masters level (0.652). He is in deficit (three wins, four losses) in five-setters, and the fourth round reached at Wimbledon is as good as it has got in his 10 Grand Slam appearances.

Given the circumstances, and how loud opportunity had been knocking, New York proved to be the most disappointing of 2017. Zverev had claimed back-to-back hardcourt titles in Washington and at the Montreal Masters, and arrived at Flushing Meadows declaring he felt “different about this Grand Slam than I have felt before about the Grand Slams.”

Out he went to Coric in four sets.

“Grand Slams is something I want to improve next year. I want to get further in those tournaments. I want to improve them,” Zverev said pre-tournament. “But, you know, it's going good for me. I'm only still 20 years old. You can't have it all unfortunately, but it's not going bad.”

Far from it, considering the versatility that allowed him to beat Novak Djokovic and claim a debut Masters crown on clay in Rome and triumph on hard courts of Montreal against Federer in 2017. Then there are the smaller titles won in Washington, Munich and Montpellier, taking his career tally to six.

Yes. Already.

“I think physically I’m a lot stronger - I have showed that over a lot of matches. I am able to last against the best guys. Not only last, but play at the highest level at the end of matches,” Zverev said at the season-ender in London, while also nominating improvement in the key statistic of second serve points won.

“Also mentally, I’m able to finish out matches, able to compete with the best in close matches.”

He certainly did in last year’s epic Australian Open third round clash with Nadal that lasted five sets and over four hours. However high the bar has been set, and however harshly he may mark himself at times, expect the youngest player in the top 35 to clear it on one of the game’s four biggest stages some time soon.

“I doubt about myself, I think the doubts are good in life. The people who don’t have doubts I think only two things: arrogance or not intelligence.”

"When these kind of matches happen you suffer, but I really enjoy these moments. I really enjoy suffering, because what's harder is when I am in Mallorca last year and I had to watch these kind of matches on the TV."

For most players, five singles titles, two ATP World Tour Masters 1000 trophies and a career-high ATP Ranking of No.3 — all by the age of 20 — would be tough to top. As Alexander Zverev proved over the course of 2017, he isn't most players — and he also isn't easily satisfied.

"I think improving on the Grand Slam performances is one thing [to work on]," Zverev said. "The furthest I got was to the fourth round of Wimbledon. A lot of times it wasn't because I played badly, but because I played very good opponents; I lost to [Rafael] Nadal. I lost to Milos Raonic at Wimbledon. Both times in five sets. That's nothing to worry about too much. But obviously that's one goal for me this year."

In May 2017, Zverev downed a tough slate of opponents — current World No. 11 Kevin Anderson and four players who were inside the Top 30 of the ATP Rankings, including Novak Djokovic in the final, to lift the Internazionali BNL d’Italia trophy and become the youngest winner of an ATP World Tour Masters 1000 title in 10 years (since Djokovic). Zverev continued his run of form by claiming another ATP World Tour Masters 1000 trophy three months later at the Rogers Cup in Montreal, where he defeated Roger Federer 6-3, 6-4 to hoist the title. To close the year on a high note, Zverev became the youngest qualifier at the Nitto ATP Finals since Juan Martin del Potro at the 2008 season finale.

While he has achieved plenty, the 6’6” German can still pick out his own shortcomings. And while the Grand Slam losses might not keep him up at night, that doesn't mean Zverev hasn't spent his waking hours calculating ways to improve. And if any feather is missing in his cap, it is a breakout performance at a major — Zverev has yet to advance to a quarter-final at a Grand Slam.

"I'm No.4 in the world for a reason," Zverev said. "I'm not trying to sound cocky or anything, but I've always said that I've been working hard physically; I'm always trying to improve my performances at Grand Slams. Hopefully I can do so this week.”

Zverev feels that cardio has not played a factor in his early losses. The right-hander believes he can last five sets if pushed to the limit; his opponent's skill levels had more to do with his losses at the Grand Slams than his fitness.

"For me, physically when I go five sets, I feel fine," Zverev said. "As I said, I lost to Nadal on a grass court and [Raonic] on a hard court. So, it's not a big thing to worry about for me. As I said, I had one bad match at a Grand Slam last year, at the US Open. Besides that, I don't think it was that big of a deal."

Zverev will have a chance to show why those losses were not "that big of a deal" at Melbourne Park, where he begins his campaign against Thomas Fabbiano.

The potential competition from all comers in Melbourne hardly bothers the German. But if he is to match or top his career-best performance at a major, advancing to or further than the Round of 16, he may need to take out his older brother, Mischa Zverev, in the third round to do it. How would he handle that moment?

"I think it would be a special moment for all [the family]," Zverev said. "I mean, two brothers playing at a Grand Slam against each other, you don't see that very often. If it happens, of course I want to win and I think he will want to win as well. It will be a fun moment for the entire family."

Twice Thomas Fabbiano served to take a set from fourth seed Alexander Zverev during their first-round match at the Australian Open on Tuesday. But both times Zverev raised his level and broke the Italian en route to his first win of the 2018 ATP World Tour season, a 6-1, 7-6(5), 7-5 victory on Rod Laver Arena.

“I think I picked up my energy a little bit and was a little more intense on my returns,” Zverev said on court after the match.

You May Also Like: More Upsets On Day 2 In Melbourne

The 20-year-old rolled behind 47 winners, including 17 aces, and broke Fabbiano five times in the two-hour and 22-minute contest. It's the second consecutive year the 6'6” right-hander has advanced to the second round in Australia.

Last year, Zverev fell in the third round to eventual finalist Rafael Nadal in five sets. This year Zverev will be looking to reach his first Grand Slam quarter-final. The World No. 4 posted his best Grand Slam result at Wimbledon last year, reaching the fourth round (l. to Raonic).

Seventh seed David Goffin started his 2018 season where he left off in 2017. The Belgian overcame German qualifier Matthias Bachinger 6-7(3), 6-3, 6-2, 6-4 in two hours and 33 minutes.

Goffin ended his 2017 as the finalist at the Nitto ATP Finals, falling in three sets to Grigor Dimitrov at The O2 in London. Goffin, en route to the biggest title match of his career, also upset World No. 1 Rafael Nadal and World No. 2 Roger Federer. The Belgian will next play 36-year-old Frenchman Julien Benneteau, who beat Taro Daniel of Japan 6-7(6), 7-6(7), 6-4, 6-1.

Zverev seeks his first appearance in the fourth round at Melbourne Park
Alexander Zverev's 2017 season was the definition of an eruption. The 20-year-old talent went from a very respectable 24th in the ATP Rankings at the start of the year to fourth at the end of it, finishing behind only Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer and Nitto ATP Finals champion Grigor Dimitrov.

Coach Juan Carlos Ferrero knows what it takes to expand on that, to get to the top, and to win a Grand Slam. The 2003 Roland Garros champion and former World No.1 is keen on keeping Zverev on track and not skipping steps in the young player's growth process.

"Sascha's goal is to keep growing and, in order to grow, [he] needs to keep playing matches and experiencing things -- both good and bad," Ferrero said. "In Spain, we say you go 'from day to day and match by match.' The immediate focus is on the next match; after that, it's [to win] the tournament."

When it came to winning both matches and tournaments, Zverev didn't miss out on many opportunities in 2017: The German triumphed in Montpellier, Munich, Washington, D.C., the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 in Rome and the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 in Montreal.

Despite those accomplishments, Zverev is eager for more -- specifically, better performances at Grand Slam events. His best result to date at a major event was a fourth-round loss to Milos Raonic at Wimbledon in 2017.

"I think improving on the Grand Slam performances is one thing [to work on]," Zverev said. "The furthest I got was to the fourth round of Wimbledon. A lot of times it wasn't because I played badly, but because I played very good opponents; I lost to [Rafael] Nadal. I lost to Milos Raonic at Wimbledon. Both times in five sets. That's nothing to worry about too much. But obviously that's one goal for me this year."

Not reaching a goal is never easy to digest. That's where Ferrero has stepped in. Where Zverev might look at the negatives in a loss, Ferrero, aware of Zverev's standard for excellence, redirects his pupil's attention to the positives. The Nitto ATP Finals was a particular case.

"It was his first time playing in London. The objective was to get to the semi-finals but after the match against Federer, Zverev was listed as the favorite over [Jack] Sock," Ferrero said. "Being the favorite just doesn't benefit you. That was an intense match and you could tell Zverev wasn't experienced in handling those situations.

"Sascha is a perfectionist; he likes to train a lot, he's very professional in everything he does, which makes losing that much harder to swallow. No one likes losing. He's bothered by defeat but that also makes him think, it makes him grow and makes him understand the importance of having a team around him, with a lot of experience."

Watch Live

Watch Live

If not knowing how to lose is Zverev's biggest issue, then Ferrero is ready to fix that.

"That's something normal because he's only 20 years old and not knowing how to lose won't hurt him in the long run," Ferrero said. "In difficult matches, you have to adjust and learn how to play as though it's a training match and handle the tension that way."

The pressure that comes with competing in the spotlight and under high expectations are also matters that Ferrero is equipped to deal with.

"Being in constant focus at this age isn't easy," Ferrero said. "It's a day-to-day burden because now, in every tournament and in the Grand Slams, it becomes a matter of 'let's see if he wins.' That's not easy to cope with. As a team, we try to create a bubble around him, so these things don't affect him as much.

As for Saturday at the Australian Open, Ferrero expects a tough outing against inaugural #NextGenATP champion Hyeon Chung. The Korean holds a FedEx ATP Head2Head advantage over Zverev, 1-0. Ferrero knows the contest will be a tricky one for his charge.

"Chung is a difficult player to defeat," Ferrero said. He's a very rubbery player who plays a level game and it makes things uncomfortable. Still, we have a good feeling about this.

"The early rounds of a Grand Slam are never easy, but Sascha will benefit most from reaching the third or fourth round. His match tomorrow is hard and if he wins, he'll have to play Albert [Ramos] or [Novak] Djokovic. But [Zverev] learns from these situations. Let's see how it goes."

Alexander Zverev has proven his talent, soaring into the Top 5 of the ATP Rankings with five ATP World Tour titles last year, but once again fell short at a Grand Slam.

After a tough five-set loss to Hyeon Chung on Saturday, the World No. 4, still waiting to reach his first quarter-final at a major, received some valuable advice from 19-time Grand Slam champion Roger Federer.

Remembering his own struggles early in his career, Federer reflected that it is not always easy to progress to the latter stages of a major for the first time. The Swiss did not advance past the quarter-finals at that level before breaking through and winning his first Grand Slam title at Wimbledon in 2003.

“Give yourself time, maybe set the bar a bit lower,” Federer told the press he advised Zverev. “First let's maybe try to look for a quarter-final or a semi-final, not just right away coming to the Australian Open or US Open thinking, 'I have to win this thing'.

“Be patient about it. Don't put yourself under unnecessary pressure. Learn from these mistakes. Whatever happened happened. Unfortunately you have to believe in the process you're in right now. You had a good off-season. You're working hard. You're doing the right things. It's maybe not paying off at the Grand Slam level, but just stay calm, don't dig yourself into a hole. There's no reason for that right now.”

Explaining why he wanted to help his younger rival, who beat him to win the Rogers Cup in Montreal last year, the defending Australian Open champion added, “I just thought some nice words would maybe cheer him up, get him over the loss a few more hours earlier than it normally would.

“It's supposed to hurt. I'm sure it did. He looked crushed when I saw him. I gave him a tap on the shoulder and said, 'Come on, it's not too bad. It could be worse',” said Federer.

Zverev will perhaps look to use this advice in future Grand Slam championships, which he has admittedly struggled in.

“I have some figuring out to do with what happens to me in deciding moments in Grand Slams. It happened at Wimbledon. It happened in New York. It happened here,” said Zverev.

The Internazionali BNL d’Italia and Rogers Cup champion, disappointed after losing from two-sets-to-one up, summarised his thoughts on his level and his Grand Slam troubles in his press conference.

"I think game-wise my level was good," reflected Zverev. "I think I should have won in four sets but I think for four sets, as I said, the match was [at a] very, very high level and very intense. I'm still young, so I have got time. I definitely have some figuring out to do for myself.”

“I doubt about myself, I think the doubts are good in life. The people who don’t have doubts I think only two things: arrogance or not intelligence.”

"When these kind of matches happen you suffer, but I really enjoy these moments. I really enjoy suffering, because what's harder is when I am in Mallorca last year and I had to watch these kind of matches on the TV."

Alexander Zverev, the 20-year-old tennis wunderkind now ranked fourth in the world, has everything a future champion could hope for. He’s tall — 6 foot 6 — yet coordinated. He has a strong serve and hits deadly forehands and backhands. Zverev already has six ATP titles, including two Masters titles he won by beating Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer in finals. There’s just one problem: At Grand Slam tournaments, he’s a dud.

There’s no obvious reason why: Zverev looks and trains like a Grand Slam contender. His serve and steady strokes should dominate in best-of-five-set matches, and by all accounts he’s in excellent physical shape. Yet at major tournaments, he struggles and, inevitably, stumbles. In his career as a pro, Zverev has never gone beyond the fourth round at a major, and he only got that far once. He never reached higher than the third round at the Australian Open and French Open, and he topped out at just the second round in the U.S. Open.

When you compare Zverev to other current tennis stars, his Slam failures stand out. Active men’s pros who have won majors produced a range of results in their early years.1

Rafael Nadal, the most astonishing youngster of the bunch, won 17 ATP tournaments through his age-20 season, including one French Open title. Nadal leads top pros with the highest overall winning percentage, followed by Djokovic, Andy Murray, and then Zverev. Through last year, Zverev even had a winning percentage of .407 against players ranked in the top 10, which was better than that of Federer and Djokovic at the same age, though still only good for fifth best on our list of standouts.2
But at the Grand Slams, Zverev fades away. He has the second-worst winning percentage among this group, just barely ahead of Juan Martin del Potro. Djokovic, now the winner of 12 major titles, had reached one Grand Slam final before the end of his age-20 season. Andy Murray reached the fourth round at three of the Slams. Even Marin Cilic, who had a losing record in his early years, had a higher winning percentage than Zverev in Slams.

Zverev’s early losses don’t seem to have anything to do with unlucky draws, either. Some matches, in fact, are the opposite: He blew wins that, by rankings, should have been his. In 2015, he lost the second round of Wimbledon to a wild card, the small, quick American Denis Kudla. In 2016, Zverev was seeded No. 27 at the U.S. Open when he lost to an unseeded Brit, Daniel Evans. Last year was the worst of all. At the French Open, he lost in the first round to Fernando Verdasco, a 33-year-old solid clay court player, but unseeded. And then at the U.S. Open, Zverev, ranked No. 4 in the world, couldn’t outhit the smaller and unseeded Borna Coric, who won in four sets. (Coric lost his next match.)

So far at the Australian Open, Zverev has won two rounds fairly easily and will face another young opponent, 21-year-old Hyeon Chung, who is not seeded, in the third round. If Zverev gets through that round, he could next face Novak Djokovic, who is trying to make a comeback from his right elbow injury. In other words, this just might be an ideal Slam for a strong Zverev run.

No matter what happens, though, Zverev has one thing working in his favor: time. Tennis champions are lasting longer these days, but Federer and Nadal won’t be around forever. And Zverev looks like he can still improve. If all goes well, maybe his Grand Slam story will change from struggles to dominance.